SF-BW512L 12x BR sled GB *CLOSED*

[qumefox]

Sorry guys, didn't make it by the post office before they closed today.

The domestic stuff has been tagged, bagged, and paid for though. All I have to is drop them by the post office first thing monday morning. I'd rather not dump them in a dropbox somewhere.

The three international shipments.. I need more information to do the shipping tags. Mostly just the receivers phone number for the export information. I'm sending PM's out on this right now.

 

[qumefox]

Majority of these went out today. The closest people should get their sleds in a couple of days.

Only 3 haven't been sent yet. SHIN and GiFace's will go out tomorrow.

Aryntha's will go out whenever the copper gets here so I can make a heatsink for his build.

 

[Morgan]

the 4 aixiz lenses I have are supposably the broadband coated ones. 3 of them are the bluish 'wrong coated' ones, only one appeared to have the correct yellowish coating. That's the one that scored 2% less than acrylic. 192mW for the acrylic vs 188mW for the 3 element lens. All tests were done driving at 200mA btw.

Here's the results.
acrylic - 192mW
'correct' broadband aixiz 3 element - 188mW
'wrong' broadband aixiz 3 elements (3 tested) - 150mW-164mW
aixiz 650 glass lenses (4 tested) - 170mW - 173mW
broadband 3 element lenses from this seller (5 tested) 185mW-199mW

Okay, I've some tests with various lenses too and much to my surprise... Similar results to yours.

All tested at 200mA

Jayrob 405-G-1 - 260mW
Correct coated 3 Element Glass lens - 195mW
Standard Aixiz Acrylic - 196mW!
Standard Aixiz Acrylic, (but with small aperture), - 188mW

This brings up some questions doesn't it? Like where were all the gains comming from a while back? So, I dug out the very first PHR I built and checked that. It might have been a littl grubby but not too bad and had the small aperture. Only 165mW. My maths seems to be letting me down today so if you can work out the percentage gains from the old Acrylic through the 3 Element glass and the Jayrob I'd be grateful but my poor maths says the gain from 3 Element Glass to the 405-G-1 is 33%? That would suggest to me that the quality of the glass lens has dropped, no? The gain used to only be 15%. I will repeat the test again tomorrow to confirm I did everything correctly as this was a quick test but I don't expect the results to change much, (they are certainly in line with your results and I'm guessing would plot pretty close to my diodes).

I think the spurious reading here is the very old acrylic lens. It may have degraded quite a bit as my poor maths is telling me that a 405-G-1 is 57% better.

If this is consistent with a change of lens then this is one for the main forum I think. Concur?

[EDIT: Ah-ha! (And not the band!) I just tested a pre Casio Aixiz 3 Element Glass lens and guess what... 225mW. Just about 15% better than the standard Acrylic and the 3 Element Glass lens now being supplied. That's the piece of the puzzle that was missing. Definitely not the same quality lenses any more. I know what I'm fitting to my 445 build now!]

M

 

[qumefox]

I'm just happy I didn't screw something up in my testing. I figure the lack of performance vs acrylic.. at least at low powers would have been noticed by now if what I was seeing was true. And the gain you measured is indeed 33%. That's roughly in line with the original gain of the 405-g-1 compared to acrylic, so that does certainly point to the performance of the aixiz glass going downhill.

I think it's also pretty clear that the broadband lenses I got direct from china are indeed the same ones aixiz carries. They both look and perform identically.

And yes. This lack of performance should indeed be brought to people's attention regarding the aixiz glass.. after all.. as it stands. for sub 250mW 405nm (and probably 445 as well) builds at least, there is little to gain by using the glass. For higher powers, the only benefit is glass won't melt.

I should probably compare the red coated aixiz lenses to acrylic with a 658nm diode while I have all the stuff set up, to see how much real gains are had from those as well.

 

[Morgan]

I think testing the red is a good way forward. It may also be prudent to perform the same tests with 445nm as it may return different results.

I'm actually quite disappointed by this little test. I guess noone has spotted it yet because the assumption was that there was a difference. I know I have done similar tests in the past with 445nm and had definite gains with the glass but we may have seen a change in lens since then. Maybe the broadband coating is more suited to 445nm but that still seems to be selling us short by losing the gain for 405nm.

I'm not sure how power increases in diode output would change the figures that much but more tests again here I feel.

I'm so glad this has come up. At least you can be reasonably confident that you can add 30% to your initial measurements for these. You will obviously need to get a 405-G-1 to confirm this but as it stands our readings through lesser lenses are close enough to extrapilate.

Good work here I think.

More to come...

M

 

[qumefox]

Yeah i'm going to order a couple of 405-g-1's when I get paid again. One for me and aryntha wants one for his build anyway.

 

[Morgan]

You won't regret it...

M

 

[treb76]

When I first buolt my blue 445nm, I took a power reading with the stock acrylic and AixiZ 405/445nm glass. Much to my disappointment, the glass lens performed worse than my fresh acrylic. Unfortunately, I dont have any hard numbers to say exact losses. Was pretty disappointed though, especially after reading all of these comparisons saying that this lens was almost as good as a 405-G1 and with even better spot characterisics. Wish we could get a 405nm only or 445nm only.

 

[qumefox]

power loss or not, glass lenses still have the benefit of not yellowing or melting. Running high power 405 or 445 means you either use aixiz glass or a 405-g-1 or 2.

What color were the reflections off the 405/445 lens you had? Aixiz had a batch of bad coatings. If they're bluish looking, you have one of the bad ones. the correct coatings will have a yelowish coating.

Having a small pile of broadband coated ones on hand.. I also determined the lighter the yellowish tint looked, the better that lens performed. Mine ranged from a really light yellow, to almost a gold. The closer to gold, the lower it scored. But as I said. none had a drastic improvement over acrylic.

 

[qumefox]

Ok everything except aryntha's has shipped. And I expect the stuff for his build to come in this week.

 

[treb76]

power loss or not, glass lenses still have the benefit of not yellowing or melting. Running high power 405 or 445 means you either use aixiz glass or a 405-g-1 or 2.

What color were the reflections off the 405/445 lens you had? Aixiz had a batch of bad coatings. If they're bluish looking, you have one of the bad ones. the correct coatings will have a yelowish coating.

Having a small pile of broadband coated ones on hand.. I also determined the lighter the yellowish tint looked, the better that lens performed. Mine ranged from a really light yellow, to almost a gold. The closer to gold, the lower it scored. But as I said. none had a drastic improvement over acrylic.

Has a yellow coating. I wouldn't dare put a 'for red' coated lens in there.

 

[qumefox]

Has a yellow coating. I wouldn't dare put a 'for red' coated lens in there.

Interestingly enough the blue 'wrong coating' 445 lenses suck for red as well. Those particular lenses aren't good for anything as far as I can tell.

 

[FlightLevel350]

Diode arrived today, thanks qumefox.

 

[laser_freak]

Mine arrived today as well. :thanks:

 

[qumefox]

Considering that your both on opposite ends of the country from me.. Everybody in the US should have gotten theirs today then.. since everybody else domestic should be closer than you both heh.

They didn't get crushed in transist did they? I tried to reinforce them.

 

[Vaporizer]

So far mine is a no show. Doesn't concern me though. As rural as I live, it's not uncommon for it to take an extra day or 2 sometimes. Other times, I can be the 1st delivered.
I can get a 1st class pkg in 3 days from FL, 3-4 from CA and 5 days if it's 2-3 states away.
USPS.....go figure lol